Monday, June 7, 2010

The words of James Madison

What would James Madison and the founding fathers think of the modern day tea party movement? What would they think of American citizens "protesting" a democratically elected President and undermining his agenda at every turn? What would he think of a movement that borrows it's name from protesting taxation without representation? To answer these questions I went back and read the Federalist papers and came upon these words:

"the latent causes of factions are sown in every man, and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity, according to the different circumstances of civil society. A zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points have in turn divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for the common good."
-James Madison
Madison went out of his way in his writings to warn of the destructive nature of letting passion and enthusiasms shape people's thinking and thus viewing the world in an us versus them mentality. We have all at one point spent much more time trying to "vex" or oppress each other rather than work for the common good. What would Madison think of us?

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